The big picture: exploring the metabolic cross-talk in cancer

Abstract

Metabolic reprogramming is now well established as one of the hallmarks of cancer. The renewed interest in this topic has spurred a remarkable advance in our understanding of the metabolic alterations in cancer cells and in the tumour microenvironment. Initially, this research focussed on identifying the metabolic processes that provided cancer cells with building blocks for growth or to prevent oxidative damage and death. In addition to providing detailed insight into the mechanisms by which oncogenic signalling pathways modulate metabolic processes, this research also revealed multiple nodes within the metabolic network that can be targeted for the selective elimination of cancer cells. However, recent years have seen a paradigm shift in the field of cancer metabolism; while early studies focussed mainly on the metabolic processes within a cancer cell, recent approaches also consider the impact of metabolic cross-talk between different cell types within the tumour or study cancer within the organismal metabolic context. The Review articles presented in this themed Special Collection of Disease Models & Mechanisms aim to provide an overview of the recent advances in the field. The Collection also contains research articles that describe how metabolic inhibition can improve the efficacy of targeted therapy and introduce a new zebrafish model to study metabolic tumour-host interactions. We also present ‘A model for life’ interviews: a new interview with and a previously published one with that provide insight into these two leaders' personal scientific journeys that resulted in seminal discoveries in the field of cancer metabolism. In this Editorial, we summarise some of the key insights obtained from studying cancer metabolism. We also describe some of the many exciting developments in the field and discuss its future challenges.

Differences in lipidomics may be potential biomarkers for early diagnosis of pancreatic cancer

“…Pancreatic cancer is regarded as the most common and lethal disease of the digestive tract tumors. Altered metabolism and tumor microenvironment are considered as the Hallmarks of cancer 13 . Given the above considerations, deep thinking about metabolic dysregulation in patients with pancreatic cancer could be a novel discovery of tumor therapeutic targets 14 .…”

Metabolic Reprogramming of Colorectal Cancer Cells and the Microenvironment: Implication for Therapy

“…The diet modulates the efficacy of CRC by reshaping the TME. As reported by Iwamoto et al, the addition of lipids to the TME prevented the tumor inhibitory effect of anti-angiogenic therapy [247,248]. The ketogenic diet, low in carbohydrates but rich in proteins and fat, reduced tumor size in mouse models of colon carcinoma, and recently, it was found that this kind of diet can enhance the anti-cancer therapy efficacy of PI3Kα inhibitors [248,249].…”

Viscum album mother tinctures: Harvest conditions and host trees influence the plant metabolome and the glycolytic pathway of breast cancer cells

“…Aerobic glycolysis is characterized by increased glucose uptake and lactate production, and it is the most common feature of cancer metabolism ( Bazylianska et al, 2021 ; Kalezic et al, 2021 ). Natural compounds that interact with components of glycolytic pathway can reduce the cancer cell’s ability to synthesize nucleotides, proteins, or lipids ( Schulze and Yuneva, 2018 ). The reduction in the glucose uptake, glycolytic enzyme activities and the consequent lactate production is a very interesting effect of V. album MT, since this treatment probably interrupts the Warburg effect ( Schulze and Harris, 2012 ).…”